Zoot Suits

ContempoSuits.com is the place to get amazing Zoot Suits for sale for that fun party or wedding that you are going to. A Zoot Suit refers to a 3-piece suit that has a dramatically longer jacket. The jacket often has over-padded shoulders to exaggerate the bagginess of the suit. These aren't your regular style men's suits you wear to Church. A zoot-style suit is entirely different than a double-breasted suit, which was common in those days. Zoot suits since the 1930s and 1940s were quite popular with the Pachuco men and have always been about attitude and thumbing your nose at conventions. The zoot suit was quickly adopted by African-American men in the late 1930s and became the original Men's Fashion Suit for men who thumb their nose at tradition just like the Pachuco did.

ContempoSuits.com is a great online website store where we buy men's vintage-style zoot suits because we stock our zoot suits on sale. After all, fast shipping is our priority. Don't wear a boring old suit to your prom. Vintage style 1940s-era Zoot Suits for Prom have been the thing to wear lately for Juniors and Seniors nationwide.

Where can you wear a zoot suit?

Many customers buy our men's fashion suits, including our inexpensive Zoot Suits, online for Costume Parties and Halloween. Forget about dressing like a Pirate or Vampire when you learn where to buy inexpensive Zoot Suits that make fantastic costumes for Halloween. Don't waste your money on a so-called "zoot suit" outfit when you can learn where to buy the real thing on sale for a great price. We are an online suit store that carries all the accessories you need. We also carry many matching color shoes for men's fashion suits, including our zoot suits and hats. You can buy the same gangster-style long jacket suits that you will see in both gangster movies and television shows and all the fancy shirts and dress shoes online to go with them.

How did people start wearing zoot suits?

Here is a little online Zoot Suit History to know about. People have an inherent nature to be free and not be told what to do or how to dress. Some people prefer to dress like everyone else, and some utterly refuse to dress in a fashion deemed acceptable by society at large or even fashionable. During the 1930s, a strange new style of cheap men's suits appeared worn by Pachuco, Western Mexican American men. These cheap-style suits were never seen before in the inner cities and barrios of the United States. A dress suit that just wasn't meant to let the wearer blend in with the rest of the crowd. A dress suit is designed to be outrageous. Zoot Suits for men back then were a prime example of counter-culture in a way that was not much different than Hippies growing their hair long during the 1960s in defiance of society's norms, which is just what counter-culture Pachuco men favored. The Zoot suit is a men's suit with outrageously long suit jackets with overly padded shoulders, extra baggy pants, and peg-leg style cuffs on the bottom of the pants. Nothing is mainstream about these long jacket get-ups in any way, shape, or form. The first time you saw one of these wild-looking suits, you were either watching a movie or a television show unless you're old enough to remember when men wore them for real. The visual impact should come to mind when you see someone wearing one. The man in this type of suit wants to showcase his bravado and be noticed in a way that lets people know he is not a man to take lightly and won't be pushed around. It's pure machismo.

Were they considered counter culture?

The original Zoot suit had to look as counter-culture and anti-conservative as possible. Exaggeration sums up the zuit suit the best. The way it fits simply has to be the very opposite of what your standard business suit should look like. Where a regular suit is supposed to be tailored-looking or standard fitting, these bad boys have to be as baggy as possible. On a regular suit, the shoulders are supposed to be exactly the width of the man wearing it. On a Zoot suit, those shoulders of the jacket look like they are going to the next county over. Where the lapels on a regular suit are supposed to be medium width and not draw attention, You guessed it. You get the complete opposite with this type of suit. The lapels may look broad and bold, drawing complete attention to the suit. Of course, one of the main differences that sets these suits apart from regular styles is the length of the jacket. A standard suit length generally breaks right at the hip of the man for a proper fit, whereas the zoot suit jacket comes down the thigh as close to the knees as possible for an over-the-top look. Everything that a suit suit is just smacks of a counter-culture that was bent on defying what a man is supposed to wear in public. The best suits were always tailored garments created to fit the wearer in a manner that looked like they were made for that man. A dress suit jacket that fit correctly and slacks that fit as well. When you put on a suit, you were putting your best foot forward and wanted to look your very best in public with an air of respectability. The zoot suit, on the other hand, does the complete opposite. There was nothing about this type of suit with a tailored look. It takes everything you know about a suit and how it's supposed to fit, makes you look, and throws that right out of the window.

Why do zoot suits have long jackets?

You're not supposed to look like a banker, businessman, or lawyer when you wear these over-the-top-looking get-ups. These are baggy-style long jacket suits and look like you are trying to offend someone of the senior persuasion. It's really no different from the Hippies who grew their hair long and wore outrageous clothing that looked anything but mainstream and conservative. You can almost hear an old man or lady muttering to himself or herself, "Who does that person think he is wearing a suit that looks like that?" That is why these types of suits were invented. To outrage people. I want to get a reaction to the way someone with their hair painted pink would. It wasn't long before zoot suits were seen everywhere in every metropolitan area. They were worn on countless young men of African American or Mexican American persuasion, known as Pachucos, as their counter-culture message. It's the same reason that even today, teenagers and young men always dress in a manner completely different from how a grown man would dress. Depending on the era, baggy jeans of several years ago hung off their back sides, several sizes too big. Now skinny jeans that are so tight and worn also hang off their butts that they have to walk in a particular manner to move around. Teenagers always like to do their own thing in a way that gives them some identity that tells the world they are adults, even though their behavior tells them otherwise. You look at any teenager out there, whether you are in the big city or in the suburban areas, and you will find an overwhelming consensus that they think that just because they went through puberty. They think they are adults even though the way they conduct themselves is anything but adult-like. You would see young men zuit suiters strutting down the street with their broad padded shoulders, high waist slacks, and huge brim fedora hats, knowing that was it. Coming straight out of stores that sell suit suits. That is the attitude that wearing a Pachuco suit could give you back then. Not much different from today's youth wearing overly baggy jeans and shirts with their baseball hats on backward.

Why were Zoot Suits Banned During World War Two?

Once World War 2 was well underway, zoot suits were banned for several reasons. One of them was that everything was being rationed during those days, including the material made into suits. So, making a baggy long jacket dress suit for men was wasting material when either that material could be used to be made into more regularly designed dress suits or the factory capacity to make material for war materials. A second reason is that the US government didn't want anyone wearing dress or men's fashion clothes, which conveyed an attitude that they weren't part of the war effort. Uncle Sam wanted everyone to pitch into the war effort. These days, most people who wear a zoot suit wear them for entirely different reasons. Many men will wear these bold ensembles for a fun-filled evening wear outfit with beer and wine flowing freely. Many men wear these outrageous long jacket suits for swing dancing for a completely nostalgic feeling, bringing back the 1940s with swing dance music going wild. Bringing back nostalgic times has been the primary reason that anyone these days will put on one of these suits. Believe it or not, you will find that wearing one will still get the same exact reactions that they did back in the 1930s.

Always controversial and Fun To Wear.

It's a fun way to get noticed and start a conversation with complete strangers, just like men were able to do in the 1930s. When you wear one to a costume party or swing dance event, you will be surprised how many people will be curious about your zoot suit and want to know all about it and where you got it. Is this the first time you wore one? What is it made of? Etc, etc. One of our biggest reasons for keeping zoot suits alive is that, without fail, every Halloween, men all over America wear these flamboyant suits as their costume of choice. It shows that you can't go wrong with wearing one of the outrageous-looking suits when it comes to costumes. You can thank Hollywood for keeping the zoot suit alive because every time they make a movie that takes place in the 1930s, you can bet your bottom dollar that they will have a man or two hanging out on a street corner completely done up wearing one of these long jacket wide-shouldered suits with the huge brim hat and feather. Every time they put a couple of suit suits into a movie, it seems to reinvigorate interest in these long jacket-style suits and start selling again for a while. Every few years, there is an iconic movie that comes out, whether it's World War Two-era movies or during the great depression during the 1930s, maybe with gangsters in it, like Bonnie and Clyde or a movie about John Dillinger, and more than likely see a couple of guys wearing a long-jacket suit just standing around as added eye candy for the movie to instill realism for the shot. Just like when they have all the cars being 1930s period automobiles driving around or parked and changing storefront signs to vintage-looking signs to make the set look as 1930s as possible. The zoot suit is always included in a style of the day item that instantly transforms that sidewalk from modern times to the 1930s in a way that nothing else can. Whatever you want to say about these wild-looking suits, you can never say they are mundane and boring. It's like a walking one-person three-ring circus.